Saturday, September 22, 2007

The Danger of My View of God

Someone much wiser than me once said, "God made Man in His own image. And we repaid Him the favor." Often I find that in my heart and mind, the God of the Universe has been surplanted by a shoddy imitation. This lesser god is created of spiritual straw and dung. It is a harsh, demanding, judgmental god, with a huge rule book and an even larger ledger. This is god in my own image. May it die a quick death.

"What comes to mind when you think about God is the most important thing about you ."

"We must meditate on the eternal nature of God in order to worship as we should."

"Truth that is not experienced is no better than error, and may be fully as dangerous."

"Much of our difficulty as seeking Christians stems from our unwillingness to take God as He is and adjust our lives accordingly. We insist upon trying to modify Him and bring Him nearer to our own image."

Quotes from A. W. Tozer

3 comments:

Bar L. said...

reading but unable to formulate a comment.

Anonymous said...

God made Man in His own image. And we repaid Him the favor. It seems apparent that we create an image of God to suit our philosophies, culture, personality and politics. Sometimes I think that it is good to have so many views of God, even though, personally I believe God isn't any of these images and is much greater. So it is good to have, for example the all-loving, all-forgiving, all merciful and vague God of the liberals, it is good to have the social justice God of the left and it is also good to have the demanding, fearsomely righteous God of the conservatives at times - God in balance. But I often wonder if we shouldn't spend a little more time with each other's version of God. Whether a lax liberal like me needs a little of the demanding and wrathful God to keep me on the straight and narrow and the conservatives could visit with the God of the left sometime in order to put a little more love in their hearts.

What comes to mind when you think about God is the most important thing about you .

I picture God as a loving force in which we "live, move and have our being". Sometime I think of God and mankind as symbiotic beings that complete each other. Without God we are like organic clockwork with a critical piece missing and without which we cannot run correctly or happily. BUt I also wonder whether without us God feels something missing as well.

We must meditate on the eternal nature of God in order to worship as we should.

And here's the rub. What exactly is the eternal nature of God? Do we even have the remotest clue and can we worship without knowing?

Much of our difficulty as seeking Christians stems from our unwillingness to take God as He is and adjust our lives accordingly. If I knew if God is and what God was I suppose I would adjust my life accordingly but since I don't know I look to Christ as my example.

afaithreconsidered said...

Barbara and Mariam, I appreciate both of your comments. To be honest, I am not feeling up to replying yet. I am really, really tired. Not sleeping all that well.